Pitching Injuries

I believe this nails it!

Some of us are in small towns. We have no one to really talk to about issues/questions. I didn't find this site until my son was basically 16 or so. And even then, how do you take the advice of a stranger that you've never met. The more you read though, you realize that many on this board, including this poster knows their stuff. My advice would be to read and read and then read some more on this site. "Follow" some of the posters. You will get emails when they post something. Then save the emails when they post something that really hits home with you. I went back and read some Dialogs that I've had with Fenway and TPM last night. I was such a novice when I asked them some questions. I'm smarter now but probably not by a lot. I am learning though. This site is wonderful!!!

Some of the injuries to pitchers happen because of the ignorance of pitch counts. 

Our high school coach had my son throw 125 pitches and 140 pitches in two separate games.  Supposedly this coach was a pitcher in a small college during his younger days. 

Now compound this with kids playing in the field after pitching or pitching in one game and catching in the next. 

I think as parents we need to make a hard stand about this.  It's not easy being the bad guy especially with larger schools who have more kids to choose from. 

 

Its on you, why did you allow it?  

Thats the issue maybe, parents are afraid if they say something their son will not be in the game. Your son is being used that way because he is good.

Protect your pitcher.

My son was a freshman on Varsity last year.  The first game my son pitched a complete game that gave the other team their first regular season loss in 2 years. So pitching 130 pitches was easy to forget. lol

The second time is when I learned that the coach really didn't care about pitch count. 

 

Armed with this knowledge I need to talk to the coach and ask him to enforce a pitch count for my son.  Either that or I can work out a signal for my son so he knows to claim to the coach that his arm is tired.  

 

Now throw in the fact that my son was the starting Varsity QB this year and now his arm health should be protected even more. 

In many cases, I think you are correct.  Parents are afraid to say anything.  I respect coaches and I say nothing up to the point where his health, well=being, and future are concerned.  My son made JV as an 8th grade student.  JV coach was a good guy, but was maybe 23 or 24 years old.  My kid threw about 140 pitches in one of his outings (typical JV defense) and he was erratic that day as well.  I walked into the Varsity Coach's office the next day after school and told him what had happened.  I didn't have to say another word.  Varsity coach took it from there and he never threw over 80 pitches in a single game the rest of the season.

 

As a parent, its a fine line and everyone hates parents who stick their noses in where they don't belong.  But when it comes to health and well being, I think its our responsibility.  I was lucky and got the right result without having to make a big deal out of it.

Discovered this sight when my RHP was 11.  Opened my eyes.  Been his sentinel ever since.

 

(knocks on wood)

 

 

So what I get from your post is that...

 

1.  Winning is more important than your son's health

2.  You're OK with turning your son into a liar instead of teaching him to stick up for himself and talk to adults

 

 

Come on dude your first point about him beating a great team is exactly what TPM is talking about.  What if he has pitches his team to that win and then next time out blows out his UCL? Was that win worth him having surgery and being set back at least one year?

That's precisely why we let son stay on JV until end of the season when he moved up. 

 

He probably could have beat every team he faced, but reality is at that age, there is more at stake than winning a game.

 

When son was a senior, at his first outing he threw 80 pitches.  It was uncalled for,even the scouts who came to see him were surprised. The next day Mr TPM was in the AD's office. It wasnt the pitch count, it was the time of year for the pitch count. The whole idea is building up your arm strength and I dont beleive that any freshman pitcher is fully ready for that challenge at 130 pitches. 

 

These are the things that I am talking about, if your son gets hurt you will look back and say, what should I have done different. You need to visit ASMI for pitcher guidelines.

 

Thanks Coach, I know that you get it, Happy New Year and stick around, missed you!

Wow.  I love you too. 

 

Yes, I'm living my life vicariously through my son at the expense of his health. 

 

Now relax, enjoy life, enjoy a quality beer on me. 

I'm very relaxed and enjoying life.  But I also know that pitching injuries are serious business and so is developing healthy pitchers.  There's no magical formula and even if you do everything by the book (whatever that book is) it can still go wrong.  Which begs the question - why take unnecessary chances?  

 

I'm not trying to be difficult or a jerk but re-read what you put.  You justified your 15 year old son pitching 130 pitches just to win a game.  You're going to develop a sign to have your son tell the coach he's too tired.  Which if he's not too tired then it's a lie.  The more productive thing is to have your son have a conversation with the coach.  If that doesn't work then you have the conversation.  If that doesn't work then go to the AD.  If that doesn't work then then you need to know everything you need to know about all the people at that school.  At this point you may need to remove your son from the team.  If it gets this far you've stuck by your convictions and taught your son about character instead of lying.  

 

Just saying

 

TPM Happy New Year to you and your family as well.  I would love to post more but I'm staying super busy doing the AD job.

First, I'm going to attack the premise. I haven't seen anything to make me think there are more arm injuries than in the past. There are certainly more surgeries and you certainly can now come onto the internet and LEARN about more injuries than you used to. Twenty years ago, we didn't take our kids to a surgeon if he injured his arm. Matter of fact, it's quite likely we didn't even take him to the doctor at all. Guys who suffered injuries simply either quit pitching or pitched in pain.

That's how it was when I was in high school. I remember a LOT of guys who "blew out their arm." They didn't become a statistic because TJ surgery wasn't an option.

You do hear about hs kids (or younger) throwing 120, 150, even 175 pitches in a game. However, it's news because it's rare these days. When I was younger, I guarantee you there were plenty of games in which I must have thrown over 150 pitches and I wasn't alone. We didn't count pitches, so who knows. I can also remember that the studs went day after day and many of them "blew out their arm" in high school or college. I believe we're doing a much better job. I think injury rates are probably far lower than twenty or thirty years ago. We should keep learning all we can and we should protect young arms, but all this talk of an "epidemic" sometimes makes me crazy.

I recently read the typical MLB starting pitcher threw 140-150 pitches per start in the 70s. It was also normal for a good pitcher to complete 25+ games per year. To be called a "seven inning pitcher" was a criticism. Now it's a consistent pitcher with a strong arm.

 

..............

 

On July 2, 1963, Juan Marichal pitched a 16-inning shutout against the Milwaukee Braves, outdueling Warren Spahn, who pitched 151/3 scoreless innings before Willie Mays won it 1-0 with a home run. Marichal threw 227 pitches; Spahn threw 201.

 

http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_...uel-was-50-years-ago

Not sure you got the point of my post.
This is for all of you whose sons wish to play beyond HS.
Injuries take you out of the game.  If you havent established yourself either in college or professionally and a major injury occurs, chances are you never will reach it.  The majority of players don't get very far that get hurt, because these days things move very quickly and as I said you fall behind. It doesnt apply if you are a top round pick or if you have been lucky to make it past AAA, those are the exceptions.

 

This is about using common sense .  I dont expect that anyone living in a state where there is snow on the ground to understand its differentt for those where they play bb year round.

 

As far as sports injuries not as prevelant or serious please give statistics to show otherwise.

i would be curious to know how long a pitchers career lasted in those days.

 

However the problem with no pitch count is throwing until fatigue.  At this point, IMO, this is too late. 

 

I think there is a reason why MLB pitchers today average about 100 PC  before being pulled. 

I don't think you are relaxed.  You sound very uptight. 

 

And if you are not trying to be a jerk you must be a natural. 

 

I added humor to a situation that I found alarming.  Thus the "lol".  That means "laugh out loud".  You can sue me for getting caught up in the moment of a game.  

 

Concerning the sign, absolutely would I implement this sign IF after talking to the coach he ignored my sons' health.  It's not like he is stealing crab legs from supermarkets or raping girls on campus. 

 

If that doesn't work then I would talk with the Athletic Director who is the head football coach and tell him that if he wants his starting QB to return next season then he (AD) needs to talk with the baseball coach. Football is King in Texas! 

 

Concerning his arm health I believe I should be the one approaching the coach. 

 

 

 

 

If you really think a 16-18 year old, competitive male, with more testosterone flowing through his body is going to tell a coach he's "sore" or "wants to come out of a game" - you've got to be kidding yourself.  While it's your business as a parent to protect your child, going to the coach at HS is tricky. Some coaches will listen others will blow you off and don't want to talk to parents. It's the athlete that needs to have the first level of communication - it's your job to help him with how to handle that discussion.

 

I think coaches should ask the umpire ;-) - trust me I can tell you when your child has "lost it" or "had enough", but coaches don't pick up on those signs when it's a 2-1 game in the top of the 6th with 1 out... They're thinking 5 more outs that's less than then 16 he's already got. Velo is down, location is sporadic, but they've got their eye on the prize - beside the other guy's in the same boat and "we'll get to him too". All to quickly it's a 5-2 game and now your team is pressing and trying to do too much. There's never been a 3-run HR with no one on base, but the batters sure swing like they can be the first one, but end up dribbling one to the 2B or popping out to 1B. All the while, the bullpen is rested and could have easily got those 5 outs.

 

While pitch counts are important, I also am of the opinion that there's a mix of pitch count and mechanics that need to be accounted for; however, all too often a coach doesn't want to mess with mechanics because a pitcher throws strikes (somehow) with whatever herky, jerky motion he has. That motion is just not natural and eventually will cause some sort of injury. Imagine being 20 years old and not being able to pick up anything without searing pain shooting through your shoulder... By that time perhaps the HS coach has won his 3rd straight championship banner off the shoulder of the next guy who won't be able to pick up anything.

 

BTW: TPM while there is snow on our ground 3-5 months out of the year - the indoor pitching instruction business still does well, so many kids are still throwing 12 months out of the year.  When we were going through the recruiting process we felt we had to continue with lessons and stuff to be ready for indoor showcases in Jan/Feb even though last game pitch thrown is in late Oct early Nov.  Then we were 5-6 weeks away from tryouts - so it's a vicious cycle.

Most didnt last as long as many think, and for the ones that lasted, they did stuff that is not allowed these days. Reality is that most pitchers average time in ML is 4 years, for the few hundred that do make it hundreds did not. The difference was the injury factor.

One of my sons pitching coaches (2 seasons in pro ball) was Dennis Martinez, a recovering alcoholic always stressed with the pitchers how important it was to come clean if you had issues. There is only so much anti inflammatory meds  a person can take before their stomach blows up.

FWIW, I know of a few guys who actually became drug dependent due to arm issues, actually recovering drug addicts.  They chose to take strong pain relieving  drugs because they knew that any major injury would put them way behind.  

JohnF,

You hit on another point. Why stress your son's arm out as a preteen when you know for a fact in HS he will put in more time than he should because of showcases and tournaments to be seen by college coaches,scouts etc.

 

Parents with young players eager for them to play as much as they can do not realize all that will be required from them in HS.

 

A very good friend of mine who was once sons travel coach in middle school played for UM. He really helped me to understand that it wasn't really important to play during certain periods of a young ball players life, especially when one showed tools that would get him a scholarship in HS or maybe even drafted.

 

If some can understand what I am sayin' that's good, if not, I know that I tried.

I wonder why this wasn’t posted in either the Pitching & Throwing, Statistics & Scorekeeping or Injuries and Recovering forums.

Take a guess stat man!

My 2017 was called up to varsity mid-season last year to provide a couple of starts due to games being clustered due to bad weather in the northeast.  The coach (an "old-school" guy who has since departed) use our #1 starter so much, that he ended up with Tommy John during the summer.  Our new coach is younger, and pitched in college during the time when pitch counts started to set in, so I am thankful for that.

 

My son also played for a guy who pitched recently as high as AAA, and he shows the boys things like running right after the game to get the blood pumping (and I am a fan of having him take Alleve after he pitches to decrease the swelling.

 

I am not so worried about pitch counts as I am good mechanics, him taking care of his body (like running after/during game when he has pitched), and giving him meds proactively to reduce swelling.  Knock on wood, it has worked, and he is hopefully in line to start for the varsity squad.

 

The last thing I was say is that up in the northeast, we have the benefit of shorter seasons.  I hear too many stories of Tommy John surgeries in other parts of the country.  Not much of that up here, at least in my circle.

JohnF, your point about asking the umpire brought back a really disturbing memory for me. Back when my eyesite was fairly good i used to umpire a little bit. It was during a semi final game in the old Khoury league distric games, i think it was a 13u maybe. I was behind the plate and this kid on the mound was throwing pretty good. Well after the 4th you could tell something was wrong. Arm was hanging, velocity fell, his body language told the story. I kept telling the catcher, called time and walked over to the dugout but nobody wanted to listen. This young kid was the "ace" i was told and that was that. Who is an "Ace" at 13? well it got so bad they had to take the kid out and it really looked like the coaches were upset with the kid. For his age group the kid had potential, real potential but I never heard of him again. I always wonder about that young man. What could have been if his "coaches" knew what they were doing.

Parents have simply lost their minds. When it comes to athletics, parents have simply lost their minds. Not just baseball. Every sport. I get to see it every single day in my career. It's in a bunch of different sports and these kids are playing several hours a day. Coaches are often thrown under the bus for "player abuse" but quite frankly it's not the coaches. It's the parents. This board has provided plenty of evidence of it as well. Any time that an article is posted from Dr. Andrews, parents are quick to talk about how unimportant his comments are. I have parents make excuses regularly about why an athlete is having "concussion-like" symptoms but they want to pretend the kid doesn't have a concussion. Sadly, there are plenty of healthcare providers who will agree with them. 

 

What constitutes a "qualified healthcare provider" when it comes to sports injuries? They don't necessarily have "MD" after their name....

Lionbaseball,

Unfortunately, with the emoticons, it's very difficult to translate how much humor or sarcasm is supposed to be reflected by your comments.  But the words are stated and I think interpreted as having at least some truth behind them.

 

Coach's words are dead on and he is not a jerk but someone who is trying to help you understand how best to guide and protect your son on this topic.  When you comment that you were caught up in the moment of the game, that is significant.  That is the crux of the problem and the primary reason pitch counts and rest guidelines are necessary.  Competitive coaches, players and parents are all susceptible to getting caught up in the moment of the game.  There needs to be guidelines in place to protect the player, especially when these moments arise. Those moments are going to arise again and again and again. And that's no joke

I agree with you about the parents, thats why constant reminding that young bodies can break down is important.

 

Parent education on all of this is really pretty important.

 

All for pitch counts but unfortunately they are very narrow mind and leave to much to interpretation. I think the most critical and often left out interpretation of pitch counts is how they are reached. I feel those, including Andrews, who produce these pitch counts are missing that critical issue and often imply a "one size fits all" mentality. Yes I know they are just guidelines, but then you are leaving the interpretation up to those we've already established are often to dumb to follow them be it parents or coaches.  Simply saying 70 or 80 or 90 pitches is grossly inadequate.  How the pitcher reaches that total is far more critical. I'll simply say this, a pitcher who throws 85 or 90 pitches over 6 innings, never had an inning over 20 and team's had multiple innings scoring runs and having quality at bats is at less of a risk than a pitcher who throws 75 pitches in 3 innings and team's failed to produce a base runner. But by their matrix, 75 is better than 90. I really think someone needs to come up with a guideline of pluses and minuses based on number of pitches per inning and rest time between innings.

AGDAD19, that approach is fine in theory.  The problem is, at this point, you can't even get someone to follow the simple guidelines of a straight pitch count.  Look at lionsdad for example.  His sophomore son threw 130 pitches in a game and he doesn't seem to think it's a big deal.  In an earlier post, he said his son threw 125 pitches and 140 pitches in two separate games.  I'm taking that to mean that he has thrown over 120 pitches in a game 3 times by his sophomore year.  Actually, since he is a 2017, this must have happened during his freshman year.  I think by any standards, that TOO many pitches.  There is no way this dad and this coach are going to follow a more complicated formula for figuring out pitch count.

 

The most pitches my son has ever thrown is 119 and that was as a sophomore in college.  I think he has thrown over 100 three times.  Generally stays under 100.  I think he threw 105 in HS once, the others have been in college.  Let's get the word out about limiting pitches in a game and pitchers getting adequate rest at the youth level first, then we can start individualizing the formula.

 

JMO.

 

My dream would be for high school coaches to follow this rule of thumb:

 

1) 85 PC reached in inning is the last inning for the pitcher but pitcher can complete inning unless 105 PC is exceeded. . 

2) 20-30 PC in two consecutive innings before reaching 85 PC constitutes removal of pitcher.

3) More than 30 PC in any one inning constitutes removal of pitcher. 

 

I would like to see more stringent guidelines adopted by UIL for pitchers that would be mandated. 

 

There is no reason for parents or kids to have to be the "bad guy". 

 

ASMI makes recommendations, have you ever looked at it? Then you would know that there are recommendations for rest between games.

 

It is up to parents IMO, to make sure that the coaches their pitchers play for are familiar with it as well. Not all coaches are proficient in managing pitchers, heck even some ML managers have trouble with it.

 

Of course common sense rules and it is not one size fits all.  If someone interprets it that way, well I don't think they did their homework. The WWW is a huge place, anyone who can access google can at anytime ask it any question about pitching to educate themselves.

 

Let me ask a question, why do coaches remove young pitchers from the mound and put them in the SS or 3B position, the place where that player makes many throws?

 

Or why would young pitchers stop their season only to pick up a ball again in a few weeks for pitching lessons?  I don't get that, if you do please explain?

Unfortunately, high stress innings don’t receive nearly the same scrutiny as overall pitch counts.  Likewise, I believe cold weather and early season pitch totals should also be closely monitored.

For youth pitchers I agree. But why would a young pitcher be in that position to begin with, if he cant get threw an inning with the appropriate amount of acceptable pitches he should not be in it to begin with.

And yes, cold weather as well as early season pitch counts in games are important.  

80 for a first game isnt acceptable to me as a parent of a pitcher.

JMO

Would you recommend these guidelines be the same for a freshman at 14-15 and a senior at 17-18?

There has to be, IMO a physical/biological development consideration.  

What statistics are you using to back up your claims that they are on the rise? Are you honestly going to contend that an increase in surgery rates equals an increase in injury rates? That's like saying heart disease has increased dramatically over the past fifty years because heart transplants have increased. There's a logic problem in what you argues. An increase in surgeries only proves that there has been an increase in surgeries. It does not prove an increase in the injury rate - only an increase in one particular method used to treat injuries. Thirty years ago you almost never heard of TJ surgery on amateur pitchers. Is that because there were no ucl injuries in that group or because surgery wasn't a common method for treating those injuries.

 

As far as proof, though, at least at the MLB level, while TJ surgeries are slightly increasing, actual days spent by pitchers on the disables list due to arm injuries is slightly down.

 

Caution with young arms is a very positive, and fairly recent, development. I'm just saying that those screaming "epidemic" without considering the truth of the matter aren't helping things. Truth is, there has always been a problem and we do better now than ever in the history of the sport. Acting like this is a new problem is disingenuous.

Colorado is putting in pitch count rules this season and,in fact, they are lower for sub-varsity levels. Previous rules in Colorado were simply that you couldn't throw more than 12 innings in any three day span. 

Now that's what I am talking about!

Veteran ML starters are expected to throw over 200 innings a season, the expectations for rookies is lower, depending on whether they came from HS or college.

I still think they use the 30 inning Verducci rule?

I think, for the purpose of enforcement, the rules for pitch count should be kept as simple as possible.  I'm not saying my dream is the best but we have to start somewhere. 

Those of you who have sons in (or have been in) college baseball programs how receptive are college baseball coaches to players approaching them about implementing a pitch count?  

With players vying for starting positions on a large team, and thus vying for renewal of scholarships, how likely would a pitcher approach a coach about this? 

 

Or should that issue be resolved before signing a letter of intent? 

My opinion would be that this should be a consideration in the first place when choosing any program.

 

My son had two offers, recommended and chose the pitching coach (now the HC as well as PC at UF) because of his good track record working with pitchers.

 

Why would anyone go into a program without that information beforehand? I certainly not going to hook my pitcher up with a guy that doesnt follow some type of protocol.

 

Also, I want to know how good that PC is at knowing when a guy is ready to come out or just needs a trip to the mound. 

 

My personal favorite is when coaches switch pitcher and catcher (OK being really sarcastic here - just for levity)....

 

People who are anti pitch count invariably bring up baseball history, but conveniently leave out that the game and hitters have changed a lot since then. Were Spahn, Sain, Marichal, Ruth, Young, Mathewson, etc. all pitching since they were 8-9 years old?  Were they playing and pitching year round? Were they going into a travel league circuit to pitch games in front of college scouts who had their sundials to get their velo? Or did perhaps they actually grow into their bodies before seriously taking up pitching? (I'm too young to know - hahaha).

 

I get the whole pitch count argument and believe in it in general. It's a hard subject though because it is different based on development of a child as a pitcher. These are conversations you have to have regularly with your child. Before HS I think it's certainly the parents obligation to talk to whatever coach you have and determine their knowledge and acceptance of pitch counts. Also whether the coach has a love affair with the curve - yes a different rabbit hole we could jump into. Then make decisions whether you want to pay and play for that team. At HS - trust that your child will have taken all the conversations you've had and that he'll talk with the coach. If not, then there are ways to casually talk with the coach about his "pitching or pitcher" theories. Although I suspect most HS coaches come with a bit of history so you should know your answer beforehand. There are parents who decide not to have their child pitch for a specific HS and only go the showcase/travel ball option with a coach they do trust.

 

In the long run pitching isn't an inherently normal action for your shoulder as I think *any* parent has been told when they invariably take their child in for some sort of injury. Which all too often happens regardless of how you've protected your young pitchers with pitch counts, don't throw curves, eat your veggies, don't swim in the summer before the "big game", etc.